


Time Heals

by RedStarFiction



Category: Outlander & Related Fandoms, Outlander (TV), Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-05
Updated: 2016-01-05
Packaged: 2018-05-12 00:03:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,367
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5646676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedStarFiction/pseuds/RedStarFiction
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A piece set around the time of Ellen's death and Claire's illness on the ridge. Thank you for reading.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Time Heals

Jamie pressed his nose against the bakery window and breathed deeply. The smell of freshly baked bread filled him with a sense of home and he needed that very badly right now.  
Everything felt so wrong since his mam died. His father was beside himself and seemed thinner and angrier every day. His sister was trying her best but her dinners tasted awful and she never seemed to stop crying.  
Jamie had wept too, of course. They all had and his chest still felt tight with sorrow whenever he thought of his Mam. Her presence in the house was so strong he kept expecting to see her around each corner and every time he entered a room he felt her there and wanted nothing more than to hug her again. 

He had tried to hug his father that morning, to try and offer some comfort and seek some too, but after nearly crushing him in a sudden embrace Brian had asked him to leave him be. Jamie had closed the door to his father’s study and heard the familiar wail of his father’s grief, followed by terrible cursing and thumping as he pounded the desk with his clenched fists.  
Jamie had been hovering outside the door uncertain of what to do when Mrs Crook hurried out of the kitchen and ushered him away with her.   
“Dinna fash wee Jamie. Ye Da is strained wi’ sorrow but he’ll be alright.”  
“Shouldn’t we go and talk to him?”  
“No laddie, leave him be. Men grieve alone, aye?”  
She had wrapped an arm around his shoulders and propelled him ahead of her into the warmth of the kitchen where Jenny was stood on a stall at the sink peeling carrots.  
“Da’s greetin’ again Jenny.”  
“I ken that. I ha’ ears clotheid!”  
Jenny had snapped, turning to glare at him. Mrs Crook had held up her hands and tried to place herself between them but Jamie had ducked around her to return Jenny’s glare.  
“Dinna call me a clotheid!”  
“Dinna be one then!”  
“Targe Cuddie!”  
Jamie had yelled and had already been mentally preparing his next insult when Jenny burst into tears. It shocked him so much he had simply gawped at her as Mrs Crook hurried over and folded Jenny into her ample bosom.   
“Jenny … Jenny I’m sorry … I didna mean it…”  
He had padded forward softly and Mrs Crook had simply pulled him into the clutch as well, waiting for Jenny to quieten to the occasional sniff before releasing her hold on them.  
Jenny had wiped her eyes on her sleeve and Jamie had offered her his own, rather grubby handkerchief.  
“That needs washing Jamie, gi’ it here and I’ll see to it for ye.”  
“I can do it.”  
Jamie had offered and Jenny had favoured him with a small smile.  
“Ye dinna ken how to do laundry but Mrs Crook showed me. I will show ye how to do it later so ye dinna scald ye fingers or get soap everywhere.”   
The argument between them was clearly over and Jamie had nodded gamely but Mrs Crook seemed to have had enough of the Fraser children’s tempers clashing for a little while and had bade him go to the village and bring back two loaves of bread instead.  
“I can make bread.”  
Jenny had frowned indignantly, but with an excuse about the kitchen not being warm enough for dough to rise in time for dinner, Mrs Crook pressed some coins into Jamie’s palm and nudged him toward the door.  
“Besides, it will do ye brother good to be of use and out of mischief.”  
She smiled and pecked Jamie lightly on the head to show she didn’t mean it. She had given him his instructions whilst bundling him into a coat and thick knitted scarf to ward off the cold.  
“Two loaves, fresh as ye can, if the baker asks for more than two pence each, ye tell him who ye are and who the bread is for.”  
“He kens who I am!”  
“Aye, but kenning somethin’ an’ hearin’ it plain spoke are two different things sometimes.”  
“Alright.”  
“And dinna pick the loaves on ye way home or there’ll be no pie for ye after supper.”  
She warned finally, tucking a fabric sack into his pocket to carry the bread home in.  
“Aye.”  
Jamie had waved and taken off at a trot, almost giddy with the sense of freedom after days cooped up indoors.  
He had run until his lungs felt fit to burst and then slowed to a jog, delighting in the foggy shapes his breath created in front of him. He wrote his name with a finger on frosty fence posts and had found a suitably thick stick to pretend it was a sword and he was battling monsters and evil clansmen alike.  
When he reached the village he headed straight to the bakers and it was as he stood looking in that John Murray clapped a hand on his shoulder.

“Hàlo Jamie.”  
“Hàlo Mister Murray.”  
Jamie hid the stick behind his back, feeling guilty to have been playing when he knew he should be in mourning.  
“How are ye laddie?”  
“I’m verra well thank ye,”  
Jamie answered automatically and John’s lip quirked at the boy’s good manners, knowing what a terror he had the ability to be when the mood took him. He plucked the stick out of the boy’s hand and held it as reverently as any blade.  
“Ye ha’ found a fine weapon I see. Verra nice!”  
John winked at Jamie who grinned sheepishly at him in response. Handing back the stick John cleared his throat  
“How is ye father?”  
“Da is …”  
Jamie bit his lip and swung the stick absently, trying to find words that might adequately capture the state of his father. John nodded in quiet understanding.  
“Do ye think he would appreciate some company?”  
“I dinna ken Sir. A man grieves alone, aye?”  
John nodded again and sighed heavily.  
“Aye but I’ll be along anyway. How is wee Janet?”  
“She’s learning to cook.”  
Jamie shrugged; he didn’t want to talk about his sister crying, especially as he still felt a little guilty for upsetting her so much that very morning.  
“Hang in there lad, she’ll be a bonnie cook before ye ken it.”  
John grinned and then crouched down in front of Jamie.  
“Ye Da is like to be fair distracted for a wee while yet, so should ye need anything at all, either ye or Jenny, come to me, aye?”  
Jamie threw his arms around the older man’s neck and held on for all he was worth. John patted his back and hushed him gently. Once the little lad’s shoulders stopped shaking he carefully detached Jamie’s grip on him and stood him up.  
“I ken this is a terrible time for ye and I willna lie to ye and say it will stop hurtin’ any time soon, but it will get easier wi’ time. Ye mother was a wonderful woman and she loved her bairns fiercely and was sae proud o’ ye both. Ye must try and be strong and brave now, like she would want ye to be.”  
John held Jamie’s stare and smiled into those remarkable blue cat eyes.  
“Stay as honest, loyal and good as ye are and ye Mam will always be able to look down on ye from Heaven wi’ pride and ken that she did a grand job.”  
Jamie nodded, slightly awestruck by the normally stern and stoic Mr Murray speaking to him so freely but then, it seemed that the world was on its head in all ways at the moment.  
“Alrigh’. Go on and get what ye were told to and hurry home.”  
John stood up and ruffled Jamie’s hair.  
“Oh Jamie! Tonight, ye must be sure to tell Janet that she has done a fine job of dinner, whatever it’s like, she’ll appreciate ye sayin’ so.”  
*  
Jamie collected the loaves and headed for home, swinging the sack around like a catapult. As he approached Lallybroch he realised that he was slowing down and felt a twinge of guilt, still he could not deny that the prospect of going into the gloomy house was not exactly appealing.   
He hovered by the gate wondering if he could slip the bread into the kitchen and be on his way again without Mrs Crook collaring him and making him sit by the fire to warm up.  
“Jamie?”  
Brian’s voice made him jump and Jamie half crushed one loaf as he snatched the bag out of the air before it hit the ground.  
“Och! I’m sorry! I didna mean to scare ye.”  
Brian offered guiltily and stepped forward to rescue the food.   
“I wasna scairt.”  
Jamie passed it to him and looked up at his father cautiously under his lashes. Brian seemed better than he had for days and Jamie wondered whether, like him, his Da had just needed to be out in cold and wet for a while to feel normal again.   
“Ye dinna wish to go inside and get warm?”  
“I’m no’ verra cold Da and it’s good to be outside.”  
Brian smiled at him, the first part was clearly not the truth, Jamie’s fingers were red with cold and his nose was running, but the second part was so abundantly true Brian couldn’t fault the lad.  
“Aye it is. The house doesna feel quite right at the moment does it?”  
“Mam is still there but she’s gone too so it feels a bit queer.”  
Jamie shrugged and Brian nodded, giving Jamie a side long look.   
“I miss her terribly Jamie, just as ye and Jenny do, and my behaviour has been a bit … erratic.”  
Brian could feel his son watching him intently and bit his lip, just as Jamie so often did and braced himself to say what he wanted to say.  
“I dinna ken if I will be a verra good substitute for ye Mam. She had a way about her that is … was … softer than mysel’. Ye and Jenny ha’ both inherited my temper, ye ken?”  
Jamie nodded and the action sent a draft under his collar making him shiver. Brian set the sack down and reached out, taking both of Jamie’s hands in one of his own and using his free hand to rub some warmth into them, his calloused palm chafing gently across the back of his son’s small, smooth hands.   
“What I mean to say,”  
Brian continued  
“Is that I canna promise I will be as gentle as ye Mam, nor as patient, but I will try. I love ye both, verra much, I hope ye ne’er doubt that.”  
“No Da.”  
“Good.”  
Brian looked out over Jamie’s head and lifted one hand to wave at Jenny, her small face visible in the kitchen window.   
“Go on in wi’ this,”  
He said handing Jamie the sack of bread  
“But Da…”  
“An’ tell ye sister to wrap up warm, I think we shall go for a ride.”  
Brian spoke over the top of Jamie’s protest and smiled at him.   
“Change ye stockings too. Those are far too thin for this weather.”  
It was the sort of thing his mother would have thought of and it sounded strange coming from his father but Jamie didn’t comment on it and hurried to do as he was asked, eager to saddle up and feel the wind whipping through his hair.  
“JENNY!!”  
He hollered, running toward the kitchen door and was dimly aware of his father calling out to him not to go around screeching like an angry kestrel. That was a far more usual patriarchal instruction!  
*  
“Da?”  
Jamie looked up with a start and blinked at Brianna, standing in the doorway to his study. The smell of freshly baked bread was wafting into the room from the kitchen and she was smiling at him with a slight frown of concern between her brows.  
“Are you OK?”  
“I am.”  
Jamie stood up and rubbed his eyes hastily to clear his head and bring him fully back to the present. He had not been asleep but in a sort of haze between wakefulness and unconsciousness that allowed his mind to wander.  
“How’s ye mother?”  
“Asleep, but her pulse is strong and she seems to be over the worst of it.”  
Brianna’s smile widened and she stepped into the room, opening her arms to him. Jamie embraced her warmly and kissed the copper silk of her hair.   
“That’s good news a leannan. I’ll go an’ sit wi’ her for a while.”  
Brianna nodded, she had managed to persuade her father to leave her mother’s side to get some rest but it was clear he had not slept at all and she knew better than to try and keep him away any longer.  
“Sure, but have some lunch first.”  
Jamie’s stomach growled and he grinned shyly at his daughter.  
“Aye, that seems wise. I dinna wish my gut to be the first thing ye Mam hears when she wakes.”  
Brianna laughed at the thought of her mother’s indignation and led the way through to the kitchen.  
“I don’t think she’d mind too much but eat anyway.”  
She placed a plate of bread, ham and cheese in front of him as he sat down at the table. Jamie caught her wrist as she moved away and bit his lip.  
“I ken ye mother will be alright, I dinna doubt it at all, but …”  
He raised his eyes to meet his daughters and held her gaze steadily.  
“I wish ye to ken that should anything ever happen to her, I would do my best to love ye well enough for the both o’ us.”  
Brianna leant forward and wordlessly kissed her father’s cheek, rough from days without shaving.   
“Thank ye Da.”  
She murmured and squeezed his hand tightly before straightening and gesturing to his plate.  
“Now seriously, eat your lunch! Or I will…”  
She nabbed a slice of ham from his plate and winked at him in the same way she might have done with Jem if he was being difficult.  
Jamie laughed, obediently picking up a piece of the fresh bread and stuffing it happily in his mouth.   
*


End file.
